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Air Transportation

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RAND research on air transportation has examined a wide range of topics, including air traffic control, air safety and security, fuel systems, and accident investigations.

Report
U.S. Airport Infrastructure Funding and Financing
Passenger air travel is at an all-time high, and demand for it is expected to rise. Will current levels of spending under existing federal policies be sufficient to enable commercial airports to make the infrastructure investments needed to meet that demand?
Jan 14, 2020
Report
COVID-19 Was Spreading Globally for Weeks Before It Was Declared a Pandemic
Worldwide exports of COVID-19 cases began increasing at an accelerating rate on February 19, 2020. That was three weeks before the World Health Organization declared the pandemic. By the end of February, nearly 40 cases per week were spreading around the globe via air travel.
Sep 22, 2020

Explore Air Transportation

Testimony
U.S.-China Aviation Competition
The United States leads in aviation capability and technology. However, as of early 2023, China continues to close the gap. What should Congress take into account when considering how to maintain U.S. competitive advantages in aviation?
Apr 13, 2023
Report
Cross-Domain Lessons for Space Traffic Management: An Analysis of Air and Maritime Treaty Governance Mechanisms
In this report, the authors examine the treaty-based governance systems from both the air and maritime domains as potential models for the development of an international space traffic management system.
Jan 25, 2023
Commentary
Grounded: The FAA Alert System Failure Could Be a Wake-Up Call
It turned out to be a system failure that grounded thousands of flights on January 11, but U.S. critical infrastructure faces a range of threats—from Russian hackers, to weather events, to angry individuals with guns. The government and organizations responsible for critical infrastructure can take steps to actively manage these risks.
Jan 13, 2023
Journal Article
Technologies for Primary Screening in Aviation Security
The article examines technologies currently in use and emerging technologies with potential for use in the primary screening of carry-on baggage, checked baggage and air cargo.
Jul 21, 2022
Dissertation
Increasing Fighter Pilot Retention with Improved Basing Decisions
Leverages a value-added model to identify changes to Air Force basing policy that could improve fighter pilot retention outcomes.
Aug 12, 2021
Report
Factors influencing domestic tourism in the UK and abroad and the role of publicly funded domestic tourism marketing: A rapid evidence assessment
This research, commissioned by the UK Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS), was undertaken to identify factors that influence people's decisions to take domestic holidays and the impact of publicly funded domestic tourism marketing.
Jul 15, 2021
Testimony
U.S. Airport Funding and Finance
Billions of dollars are spent every year on infrastructure at U.S. airports to help aviation connect the country. Where does this funding come from? And how do needs, resources, and pandemic effects vary across different types of airports?
Jun 23, 2021
Blog
COVID-19 Testing in Schools, Family Caregivers, U.S. Entrepreneurship: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on COVID-19 testing in schools, giving a voice to family caregivers, preparing for daylight saving time, and more.
Mar 12, 2021
Blog
Health Care Price Transparency, COVID-19 Vaccinations, Gun Laws: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on what private health plans pay compared to what Medicare pays, when COVID-19's global spread really began, laws that could reduce firearm deaths, and more.
Sep 25, 2020
Report
Which African Countries Are Most at Risk of Importing COVID-19?
U.S. forces in Africa are usually in unstable areas that have low levels of international air travel. Those regions are less likely to import COVID-19. The near-term driver of COVID-19 risk in Africa will more likely be the flow of travelers from Western Europe to Morocco, South Africa, and Algeria.
Sep 22, 2020
Blog
Air Travel Data to Predict COVID Risk, Heatwave Planning, Caregiver Time Off: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on using air travel data to predict COVID risk, planning for a heat wave during the pandemic, why caregivers need time off, and more.
Jun 12, 2020
News Release
New Tool Employs Air Travel Data to Predict Global Spread of COVID-19
As the pandemic enters a new phase, punctuated by emerging hot spots and continuing global spread, a new RAND tool allows policymakers to predict regional risks of importing cases of COVID-19.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
COVID-19 Cases in China Were Likely 37 Times Higher Than Reported in January 2020
Based on officially reported cases in China in January 2020, the odds of the novel coronavirus appearing by January 22, 2020, in Japan, Thailand, South Korea, the United States, and Taiwan—as it did—would have been minuscule.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
A New RAND Tool Helps Analyze Commercial Air Travel Involving Infected Passengers
Researchers combine case data from Johns Hopkins University with detailed air travel data from the International Air Transport Association to visualize how COVID-19 infections and commercial air travel have interacted to export infection risk across the world.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
Decisionmakers Should Base Travel Restrictions on Infection Rates Per Capita and Air Traffic Levels
Countries with modest numbers of confirmed cases can still represent the greatest risks of virus exportation to the United States if those countries have relatively high active case rates per capita and high levels of connectivity to the United States.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
Air Passenger Transmission Risk to GCC Countries Originated from Outside the Region
Analyses contradict the idea that Iran was most responsible for the spread of COVID-19 to Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
By January 31, 2020, at Least 1.5 Daily Infected Passengers Were Originating in China
By late January 2020, infections of COVID-19 were likely being exported from China, via commercial air travel, on a daily basis.
Jun 5, 2020
Report
Small Unmanned Aerial System Adversary Capabilities
It is difficult to detect, identify, classify, and—consequently—counter nefarious small unmanned aerial systems (sUASs), particularly in urban areas. As the U.S. Department of Homeland Security prepares for this potential threat, it will need to know the types of threat scenarios in which these systems could be used, which design elements are likely to be exploited by a nefarious actor, and which technologies and capabilities may be available in the near future.
Mar 12, 2020
Blog
Coronavirus Outbreak, Drones, the U.S. Power Grid: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on the intensifying coronavirus outbreak, cyber threats from drones, the vulnerabilities of the U.S. power grid, and more.
Mar 6, 2020

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RAND Topic:
Air Transportation

Research conducted by

Researcher Spotlight

Jeremy M. Eckhause

Senior Operations Researcher

Jeremy Eckhause is a senior operations researcher at the RAND Corporation. He has over 20 years' experience developing novel applications of operations research to a variety of applications of interest for transportation, government, and defense agencies and services. He supports and leads…
Bryan Boling

Engineer

Bryan Boling (he/him) is an engineer with extensive experience in military logistics, energy and water technologies, modeling and simulation, and other forms of predictive analytics. As a member of the Engineering and Applied Sciences (EAS) Department at RAND Corporation, Boling has contributed…

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